I awoke this morning at 6.45pm, having had three hours of sweaty, uncomfortable half-sleep on the sofa (fear not, there are no marital issues at Knowledge Towers - I was just fidgeting a lot). My alarm was not due to go off for another hour. The disturbance was caused by a rodent nibbling at something mere feet from my head. I then scuttled out into a freezing head wind, pushed my way onto three separate packed trains, and arrived at my desk, mountain of work still very much intact, unkempt, angry and trying to dismiss the idea that mice had run over my clothes in the night. I then went online to discover the following:
The UK is the 7th most stable and prosperous nation to live in in the world.
That's right, this cold, grey, rat-infested dump is beaten only by Sweden in the desirability stakes (the rest of the Top 6 are what you might call 'freak states' - The Vatican, Luxembourg, Monaco, Liechtenstein, Aldington-on-Sea, etc etc). We also rank above Canada, Denmark, Switzerland and other places that are frankly much nicer than here. Even America is in the Top 30, so what's going on? It may have something to do with the fact that the survey 'compilers' (three people, flip chart, big map, coin), Jane's Information Services (really) are coming from a military angle. The UK got a perfect score on foreign policy stability, despite getting involved in two Middle East invasions since the turn of the century. Speaking of which...
Iraq is officially not the least stable nation in the world - it's only joint tenth! Woo! I'm sure the citizens of Baghdad would be out in the streets celebrating if they weren't dead, dying, imprisoned or ravaged by grief and despair. The article expresses surprise that it dodged the 'bottom ten', though I have to say that being tenth generally means you've made it. The most unstable territories on Earth are Gaza and West Bank and Somalia, both torn asunder by displacement, political upheaval and militant attacks. Suddenly waking up with a mouse for company doesn't seem like such a big deal...
No comments:
Post a Comment